With a 66 per cent majority in the Nepal parliament, newly-appointed Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba will now lead the country’s government till the next general elections.
Deuba, who garnered a total of 165 votes out of 249 votes cast on Sunday during a vote of confidence in Nepal’s Parliament late evening, would now remain the prime minister until the next general elections which are expected to be held in 2022.
“Members of the house, the total number of present members of the house during the voting was 249. Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, who tabled a motion of confidence as per Article 76 (6) of the Constitution of Nepal to show floor is on his support, garnered a total of 165 votes. A total of 83 votes has been cast against the motion and one vote has gone to neutral,”
House Speaker Agni Sapkota announced.
With a clear majority, Mr Deuba will be chairing as Prime Minister until the next general elections, which as per Nepal’s latest Constitution of 2015 should be held at an interval of every five years.
Mr Deuba, who also is president of the ruling Nepali Congress, had been appointed as prime
minister as per Article 76(5) of the constitution on Tuesday, following Supreme
Court’s mandamus.
A simple majority of 138 votes was required for Deuba to continue as Prime Minister out
of 271 member House of Representatives.
Lawmakers belonging to CPN (Maoist Center), Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP) factions led by both Upendra Yadav and Mahantha Thakur, Rastriya Janamorcha Party and a section of lawmakers of CPN-UML had voted in favour of Deuba during the floor test.
Earlier, the apex court in its verdict ordered President Bidya Devi Bhandari to appoint Deuba as the successor of KP Sharma Oli, former Nepal PM.
A total of 146 members of the House of Representatives (HoR) had reached out to
apex court with a writ petition to demand the restoration of the house and appoint
Sher Bahadur Deuba, as the next prime minister on May 24.
This was after the Nepal President had refused to allow Deuba to form a new government as per Article 76 (5) and dissolution of the House.
With Oli failing to secure the vote of confidence on May 10, Bhandari on May 13 had
appointed Oli as prime minister under Article 76 (3) of the constitution as the leader of
the party with the highest number of members in the House.
A week after his appointment, Oli on May 20 in a sudden move recommended that the
President invoked Article 76 (5) to choose a new prime minister.
It is the President who initiates Article 76 (5) when a prime minister appointed under
Article 76 (3) fails the trust vote.
Mr Oli, however, neither sought the trust vote nor resigned, thereby creating a situation in which a prime minister was asking the President to appoint a prime minister.
